Car finance economical write off?

simonmills86

Good afternoon,

My 60 plate Peugeot RCZ broke down on Saturday reporting a pressure fault with the cooling system. It was recovered to a local garage who have ran since various diagnostics on it and concluded it is pretty much irreparable without a complete new engine rebuild which is likely to cost ££££.

The garage have kindly not charged me for the diagnostics and have basically told me in as many words that it's pretty much a write off as the work required will be substantially more than what the car is worth.

I have 11 months left to pay on the finance agreement I took out with this car over three years ago. The remaining balance is around £2,100.

I understand that my car insurance are unlikely to want to touch this as the problem with the car was not relating to an accident so I'm in a position where I'm paying for a car that is likely to never see the road again. Ironically it is only a few hundred miles from the 100,000 mark!

I will get a second opinion from another garage as this is a car I'm very fond of and I'm not going to let it go if there's something that can be done within a realistic budget but obviously I'm fearing the worst.

What options do I have here?

Do I have any recourse with the dealership that sold me the car or is this is now an issue I need to take up the finance company?

I doubt VT'ing it is an option due to the car having several scratches and aesthetic 'wear and tear' associated with a vehicle of it's age and it is likely they would want to bill me to put these issues right.

I've learned a life lesson here. I will never take out finance on a vehicle so old but unfortunately this epiphany doesn't really help me in this situation!

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Car_54

simonmills86 said:

Do I have any recourse with the dealership that sold me the car or is this is now an issue I need to take up the finance company?

Recourse with the dealership? After three years? Are you serious?

What type of finance do you have? If they actually own the car, which is likely, then the decision to write it off is not yours.

simonmills86

Clearly I'm desperate.

As most people are when they post on websites like this! Else I'd have found out the answer myself.

It's a hire purchase agreement.

molerat

VT is most certainly out of the question and not because of a few dings and scratches, you have to hand back a running car !

Your options are to either pay it off and sell / scrap it or find a cheaper way to fix it - a scrap yard engine for instance.

The car is seriously into banger territory at 12 years old and 100K miles.  Can you raise enough to pay it off - have you asked for a settlement figure ?

The_Fat_Controller

Have a read of this.

https://www.moneyhelper.org.uk/en/everyday-money/buying-and-running-a-car/cut-your-car-finance-hire-purchase-and-other-finance-costs

400ixl

Looking on Autotrader the cheapest RCZ is a 2010 (60) plate private car with 108,000 miles at £2,999.

With that in mind I would very much look for some other opinions, especially from a Peugeot specialist on what the cost would be to at least get it mobile again. If you need to get £2,100 out of it plus any repair costs it may be a feasible option.

Did the garage actually tell you what the issue was that they diagnosed? Also, what engine is it?

simonmills86

400ixl said:

Looking on Autotrader the cheapest RCZ is a 2010 (60) plate private car with 108,000 miles at £2,999.

With that in mind I would very much look for some other opinions, especially from a Peugeot specialist on what the cost would be to at least get it mobile again. If you need to get £2,100 out of it plus any repair costs it may be a feasible option.

Did the garage actually tell you what the issue was that they diagnosed? Also, what engine is it?

Thanks for the reply 400ixl. Must appreciated.

It's a 1.6 THP.

The issue seems to be with the pressure in the cooling system once the car gets to a certain temperature. I'm picking up the car later so should have more of an insight into exact details.

I'm going to take it for a second opinion just in case.

force_ten

pressure in the cooling system can be caused by a few things but the main reason is combustion gasses leaking into the cooling system causing the pressure to build up and that could be a blown head gasket or a warped head but it is impossible to diagnose without seeing the car in the flesh but that is where i would be looking first 

have you had any history of the car overheating and loosing coolant. is there any signs of the pressure venting at the cooling system expansion tank and what is the oil like at the oil filler cap have you got any milky residue or mayonnaise like substance on the filler cap

if it is a head gasket then the cost could vary from a few hundred pounds up to a few thousand pounds depending on the amount of damage found once you start stripping the head off and seeing how much remedial work is required. so further investigation is definitely required 

motorguy

Another option might be to sell the car "spares or repair" on an Ebay auction and recover what you can for it.   You could give info from the garage diagnostics and let people make their own minds up as to what it is and what to do with it.

You'd probably be best to clear the finance first, so as not to muddy the waters and put some people off.

Yes, you will be out of pocket but you're going to be out of pocket anyway, and this way you'd avoid the roller coaster of trying to either source another engine / get a repair done on the cheap (but maybe it not work)

born_again

No recourse with finance co. 👍